Allow It: Paul McCartney Urges EU to Drop Restriction on Plant-Based ‘Steaks’.

Paul McCartney has joined calls for the European Commission to reject an initiative to ban the use of terms such as “banger” and “burger” for meat-free alternatives.

A Contentious Ruling

The former Beatle has teamed up with eight British MPs who have petitioned the European Commission, contending that a ban approved in October by the European parliament would tackle a nonexistent problem while impeding progress on sustainability objectives.

These proposed regulations would mean the demise for the use of names such as cutlet, patty, banger or fillet when referring to products derived from vegetables or plant-based proteins. Suggested alternatives include the less appetising “discs” or “cylinders”.

“To require that burgers and sausages are ‘plant-based’ should be adequate for sensible people to grasp what they are eating. This also fosters behaviors which are crucial to our well-being and that of the planet,” stated McCartney.

A Prominent Campaigner

The musician is one of the world’s most high-profile advocates of a vegetarian diet. Alongside his wife Linda founded the Linda McCartney meat-free food line in 1991, and he and their daughters Mary and Stella started the global “Meat Free Monday” campaign to encourage people to eat less meat.

These meat-free alternatives have been a key component in a global movement of rising demand in products to replace meat, even if financial backing has waned since a boom during the coronavirus pandemic.

Farming Opposition

Yet with the growth of plant-based products has come a counter-movement, especially from the politically powerful agricultural and meat processing industries, which are anxious about the consequences of falling sales on livelihoods.

The EU Parliament voted 355–247 to ban “meat-associated” names from being used on vegan foods. As stated by media, Céline Imart, a member of the centre-right European People’s party, stated to the parliament: “I accept that such names are products from our animal farms. Period. No laboratory substitutes, no vegetarian versions.”

Wider Consequences

The letter backed by the McCartney family and the UK politicians contended that the EU rules could force the UK into similar measures as well, because the markets and regulation are still so interconnected in spite of the UK’s departure from the EU.

The EU has a well-known “protected designation of origin” system for stopping businesses from trading off the labels of products from certain locales, such as champagne, Kalamata olives or Italian cured ham. But the attempt to curb the use of generic terms is more controversial.

The Issue with Meanings

Many of the terms that would be banned have malleable meanings. As an illustration, dictionaries describe a sausage firstly in relation to meat but secondly as “an object resembling a sausage”. Further complicating the issue, the main description of “burger” is often given as a “flat round mass of minced meat or vegetables”.

The eight politicians backing the letter are ex- Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and former Green party co-leaders Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay.